This invention relates to a seat, and more particularly to a seat including a net-like skin member.
A seat required to exhibit satisfactory cushioning characteristics such as, for example, a seat for an automobile or the like is generally manufactured by arranging a spring member such as a coiled spring, an S-shaped spring or the like on a seat frame, arranging a pad member made of urethane or the like on the spring member and covering the pad member with a cover member made of a synthetic or vinyl leather, a fabric or the like. However, the conventional seat thus manufactured is increased in thickness including a thickness of the spring member, as well as weight. Also, the seat is deteriorated in breathability or air permeability unless it employs any specific means such as formation of vent holes or air permeation holes through the pad member. Further, employment of such means causes an increase in manufacturing cost of the seat.
In order to solve the foregoing problem, a seat was proposed which is so constructed that a front mesh layer and a rear mesh layer are connected to each other through a number of piles arranged therebetween, to thereby provide a net-like skin member of a truss structure. The truss structure permits the seat to exhibit elasticity sufficient to minimize setting thereof, so that it may be increased in properties of dispersing and absorbing a body pressure of a person on the seat. Thus, the seat exhibits significantly increased cushioning properties even when it is reduced in thickness. Further, the seat is constructed into the net structure as described above, resulting in being improved in air permeability without employing any specific means.
The net-like skin member which has such advantages as described above is stretchedly arranged on a seat back section of a seat frame and a seat cushion section thereof in such a manner that the net-like skin member on the seat back section and that on the seat cushion section are independent from each other. Such arrangement of the net-like skin member causes a hard feeling of the frame member to be significantly transmitted to the body of a person on the seat at a boundary between portions of the seat back section and seat cushion section against which the lumbar is abutted, as compared with central portions of the seat back section and seat cushion section against which the remaining part of the human body is abutted.
The present invention has been made in view of the foregoing disadvantage of the prior art.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a seat having a net-like skin member incorporated therein which is capable of eliminating a hard strike feeling of a frame member on the body of a person on the seat at a boundary between a seat back section of a frame member and a seat cushion section thereof, to thereby exhibit satisfactory seating characteristics.
In accordance with the present invention, a seat is provided. The seat includes a seat frame including a seat back section and a seat cushion section, a backing cloth member constructed into a one-piece structure and stretchedly arranged from the seat back section to the seat cushion section, and a net-like skin member constructed into a one-piece structure. The net-like skin member includes a front mesh layer, a rear mesh member and a number of piles arranged between the front mesh layer and the rear mesh layer to connect the front and rear mesh layers to each other therethrough and layered on a front surface of the backing cloth member so as to extend from the seat back section to the seat cushion section.
In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the backing cloth member is so constructed that a height thereof positionally corresponding to a central region of the seat back section defined in a width direction thereof is set so as to positionally correspond to the thoracic vertebrae of a person on the seat.
In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the backing cloth member is formed at a portion thereof positionally corresponding to the seat back section with a slit so as to extend in a width direction thereof.
In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the piles are formed by knitting a single thread between the front mesh layer and the rear mesh layer.